Peter Gustaf Tengmalm, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetPeter Gustaf Tengmalm
Swedish naturalist
Date of Birth: 
Place of Birth: Stockholm, Sweden
About Peter Gustaf Tengmalm
- Peter Gustaf Tengmalm (29 June 1754 – 27 August 1803) was a Swedish physician and naturalist. Tengmalm was born in Stockholm and studied medicine at Uppsala University.
- He spent his spare time studying birds and became an accomplished taxidermist.
- He graduated in 1785 and moved to the town of Eskilstuna, where he worked as the provincial medical officer.
- In 1792 he travelled to Scotland and England, meeting other naturalists including Joseph Banks, and returning to Stockholm in the following year. Tengmalm then became medical officer for Västmanland.
- He contributed papers on both medicine and ornithology to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, becoming a member in 1797.
- He died of dysentery, which he caught from his patients during an epidemic. Tengmalm was interested in owls and improved upon Linnaeus' owl classification in a paper to the Academy of Sciences.
- Johann Friedrich Gmelin named an owl after him in 1788 (Strix tengmalmi) in the mistaken belief that Tengmalm had been the first to describe it.
- It has since been renamed Aegolius funereus, but the common name, Tengmalm's owl, persists.
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